I used to have a lot of bad luck with crockpot recipes, especially the ones I found on pinterest. Then I realized I need to make sure to only try recipes that have a lot of good reviews (I prefer using allrecipes.com for this reason) or if it's something I found on pinterest, I only try it if there are a lot of positive comments. Since I started paying more attention to the reviews, I haven't had any gross results. There have been some that didn't suit our tastes, but nothing gag-worthy like some of the gems I've tried before.

Also, I almost always need to cook it for a shorter amount of time than stated in the recipe.

So I have tried to start making about a month's worth of meals ahead of time. By recipe, I get ingredients, chop, bag, and freeze them. Then, I just have to pull out a bag and put it in the crock pot!
So far, all the ones I have tried came out TERRIBLE.
Yes, these are recipes designed to be pre-bagged, frozen, and then put in crock pot. I follow the directions. They've all come out yuck (except the pea soup was good, but the kids wouldn't eat it.)

Do you do this? What are your favorite recipes?
I tend to not cook well anyway haha, partly why I thought this was a great idea. Please help! We're hungry!

How old is your Crockpot? I've had much better luck with our current ones from Walmart and Big Lots than I did when we had a hand me down one years ago. I understand the newer ones run hotter, but even so.

Staples around here are the Chicken Makhani from the Make It Fast, Cook It Slow cookbook (see if your library has it) and Stewed Black Beans from Not Your Mother's Slow Cooker Cookbook (ditto). I'm afraid neither is a make-ahead recipe, though.

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Amelia, married to Bear since 12/31/04; our daughter Rowan was born 8/6/09; our daughter Sapphira was born 8/17/12; due with DD3 6/17/15 (but after one two weeks late and one three weeks early, I'm not expecting a due-date baby!)

I have a smaller older crock and a brand new larger pot.
I don't think mush has been a problem, the issue has been NO flavor or the flavor is NASTY...even after following the recipe.
Lately I have noticed everything has way too much liquid, again, even following recipe.

While searching for new recipes, I can say my biggest issue is either:
1. Way too many unusual, no way to find around here, type of ingredients, or they would just straight cost WAY too much and not make this effective.

2. Ingredients are easy to come by despite potential cost, but are all very processed things. Looked at one woman's blog where almost every meal had a condensed soup and/or pasta. There were several recipes with nothing but canned junk.

I find that I have MUCH better luck when I make up my own recipes based on normal non-crockpot recipes that I use. I also think the reality is that things just will not come out the same in the crockpot as they do in the oven ya know? You have to adjust your expectations and make things that are very crockpot friendly. Also remember that you never ever have to stick to a recipe.. If you think it has too much liquid or not enough salt, change it up!!!

I find cooked then frozen crock pot meals to be the better then freeze and cook. I tried several freeze then cook meals when I have back surgery we didn't like a single one of them. And most had to be thawed before we could put them into the crock pot. Definitely preferred freezing the cooked food more. But we pretty much only like stew type things in the crock pot. We like pot roast but prefer that stove top cooked and roasted chicken in the crock pot. we do chicken 2 ways- one make a aluminium foil hammock so the chicken kind of hangs in the crock pot it comes out more like a oven roasted chicken that way. And the other is just to throw it in then it ends up being more of a boiled, falling off the bone chicken. We shred any left over meat to use for other stuff, freeze soups and stews to just thaw, heat and serve another day. There is a sweet and sour pork one we like that freezes well (after cooked, haven't tried it frozen first). And we've found if put cooked rice into a freezer bag while still warm it will stay moist in the freezer. So the whole meal is thaw and heat.

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SAHM to LR 7/26/07 and IHM 10/6/10, wife to a self proclaimed genius, ex-navy guy. Going places and doing things that I always dreamed of, but never imagined I would.

They work for me but I use a timer. So I put the frozen bag of ingredients in the fridge the night before and then the morningnof I put the slightly defrosted stuff in the crockpot which is attached to an outlet timer. It comes on at 1pm and at 5pm the food is perfect. Bad crockpot food is due to overcooking, IMO.